By TCN News,
New Delhi: Eminent Supreme Court lawyers are gathering tomorrow in a memorial meeting in Jamia Millia Islamia to offer condolences to and remember Adv Shahid Azmi, defence lawyer of several terror accused, who was murdered in his Mumbai office on February 11. The meeting is being organized by Jamia Teachers’ Solidarity Association.
The speakers include Ajit Sahi (Executive Editor, Tehelka) and senior lawyers Vrinda Grover, Prashant Bhushan and Collin Gonsalves. The program will start at 3 pm at Committe Room, Centre for West Asian Studies, Opposite Academy of Third World Studies, Jamia Millia Islamia.
“Advocate Shahid Azmi, defence counsel of Fahim Ansari, those accused in Malegaon blast of 2006 and Mumbai train blasts, was murdered in cold blood on February 11, 2010. Shahid Azmi’s murder follows a series of attacks on lawyers who dared to defend those accused of terror. Such lawyers, across the country from Uttar Pradesh to Madhya Pradesh to Maharashtra have been the targets of brutal attacks by right wing goons, often within the premises of the courts while the police watched idly. Azmi had received death threats as early as 2006 and had approached the Mumbai police, which failed to provide him any security. The MNS chief Raj Thackeray had also issued threats to lawyers who wanted to defend the accused in the 7/11 2006 local train blasts in Mumbai,” said JTSA.
Shahid Azmi was arrested by Delhi police for being a member of SIMI in 1995. In appeal, Shahid was acquitted by the Supreme Court. He graduated while serving his sentence, completing his law course after his release. He began practicing law in Mumbai upon his release from Tihar and took up many criminal cases and raised important legal issues before the Bombay High Court and the Supreme Court. The bulk of his legal practice comprised taking up cases of innocent Muslims who were harassed, arrested and tortured by the police. He had pleaded in court against the application of MCOCA as well as POTA for his clients and his successful pleading in the Ghatkopar blasts case of 2002 led to the abrogation of POTA. He played a crucial role in securing justice for Ishrat Jehan, who was eliminated in a fake encounter in Gujarat.
“In a recent legal victory for rights of the terror accused, Shahid had exposed the violence unleashed by the Arthur Road jail authorities who were torturing the under-trials into confessing their role in bombings. In his brief life of 32 years, Azmi made a lasting difference, but his untimely and violent death foreclosed rich possibilities that lay before him and, indeed for all of us interested in justice.”